Ultraman Neos Production History

Well, seeing how I can’t talk about Andros Melos due to a lack of knowledge and due to Zearth being a single movie success there isn’t a lot of things to talk about there. So there only last thing related to Ultra I can talk about from the dark period (until the Powered post remake) is Ultraman Neos. The Ultra Show originally from 1995, but later released in 2000 during the gap year between Ultraman Gaia and Cosmos. More on that to come, but as usual, we need to look at the ever important context.

In the year 1994 things got a bit rough for Tsupro. You may know of Gridman. For those unaware, Gridman was a big success for Tsupro. It was the first in-country production by Tsuburaya in over 12 years and brought in a fair sum of cash for Tsupro. The show was well received, achieved good ratings, and the toy sales were rather hot too boot. Eventually, it would even gain a sequel (kind of from what I am told it’s hard to explain) in the year 2018, called SSSS Gridman. However, way back in 1994, a direct sequel was planned for Gridman revolving around the former villain of the show Takeshi Todo and a Gridman called Sigma. That show never came to be, in fact, no shows were made by Tsupro during 1994 post-Gridman and 1995. You may be wondering what happened that prevented Sigma from being made and any other productions. Here’s where the year gets rough.

Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero happened. To keep a long story short, Ultraman Powered was a failure in many regards. A lot of cash was lost in the production of the show. Powered didn’t air in America, nor were there any other international releases, whether it be from home releases or other broadcasts. Thus no new foreign revenue was brought in by the show. To make things even worse the American co-producers ditched Tsupro with the cost of the show and in addition to this all of the workers’ union fees, effectively putting Tsupro in the red once again. In the first half of 1994, all that was bringing in cash for Tsupro was the latter half of Gridman alone, making it hard to make back these losses quickly. Due to having to pay off the debt caused by Powered multiple projects were brought to a halt, including a planned Hong Kong Ultraman series and mostly likely Gridman Sigma. To bring in more funds Tsupro also convinced TBS (Tokyo Broadcasting System) to air Ultraman: Towards The Future and Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero in 1995, making them the first new Ultra Series in over 14 years to be broadcasted on Japanese television. What happened here was surprising, Great and Powered were rather well received and watched during their airing. So Tsupro began to have another idea.

This new idea was another back to basics Ultra show, Ultraman Neos. Before we get into the specifics about the show, we have to talk about Tsupro’s new marketing approach to this Ultra. While interest was certainly gathered by the broadcast of Ultraman: Towards The Future and Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero, Tsupro wasn’t sure how stable of a foothold they had. So following in the footsteps of Great and Powered, Tsupro hit the ground running with new toys and merchandising before the show was aired,  let alone be in pre-production. In 1994 and 1995, the new Ultras planned to appear in this upcoming show—Ultraman Neos and Ultraseven 21—also started to pop up in a wave of videoes, stage shows, and other content alongside Ultraman Great, Powered, and Zearth. This group would be labeled the Discovery Ultras.

Finally, in 1995, a brief pilot film was made for the actual show. According to this film, the show was going to be about a young, new Ultra Warrior going to Earth due to an increased amount of extraterrestrial invasions that caused the Earth to enter catastrophic circumstances. Tagging along is Ultraseven 21, who is an experienced veteran asked to watch over Neos’s mission on Earth. The two Ultras would be from the M78 and the show would generally be back to basics and feel similar to Ultraman Great and Powered. These concepts also most likely stemmed from the Hong Kong Ultra series idea. Tsuburaya’s hope was to have the show air in 1996 and ride off the 30th anniversary of Ultra. However, the networks weren’t interested.

When Tsupro tried to pitch the original idea of Neos to the TV networks they were met with a chorus of nos. Networks stated that the show wasn’t original enough, not different enough from past works, and wouldn’t be able to bring in substantial enough ratings to justify its existence. Once again, TV networks thought investing in Toku was a poor idea once again. You see back in the mid-90s Toku has taken another turn for the worse in popularity. Metal Heroes had begun its decline, Godzilla was once again dead, and Super Sentai wasn’t bringing in ratings like it used to. Kamen Rider was still on hiatus and only reemerged in a few short movies, that didn’t really perform well. If a new Tokusatsu show was going to be produced at this moment it would either have to have a strong legacy behind it or be a truly unique idea and potential for success. So, thankfully, Tsuburaya had this new idea right around the corner that merged those two factors perfectly, called Ultraman Tiga.

Now you may be wondering at this point, but why did Neos get made all of those years later? Well, there was going to be a gap between Ultraman Gaia and their next new show Ultraman Cosmos and Tsupro thought that they might as well fill it with something. About midway through the 1990s Tsuburaya hit the Japanese market with a wide variety of direct to video content ranging from Ultra Series Encyclopedia videos, to products like Ultraman Powered Teaches English, and to us on the topic of Ultraman Neos, series like Heisei’s Ultraseven. Which was a direct to video series that acted as a sequel to the original Ultraseven show and its idea that Seven was the only Ultra to come to Earth ever. While the original Heisei Ultraseven trilogy of releases was finishing up Tsuburaya came up to the production crew of the series and put them to work a direct to video show that would be released in 2000 to fill the gap.

So using the leftover ideas and resources from the planned Neos show they made something new. That being the Ultraman Neos we know today. The version of Ultraman Neos that takes place in an alternate version of the M78 and follows upbeat optimist/member of HEART Genki Kagura and Ultraman Neos as they battle threats that appear due to the Unbalancing Effect (Which may be a reference to Tsupro’s past horror anthology show, Horror Theatre Unbalance). The show would also occasionally feature Ultraseven 21, who seemed to be more of a spy character that stood equal to Neos rather being his commanding officer and a war veteran.

Due to it being a direct to video production it didn’t have the highest budget nor would bring in the greatest amount of profits for Tsupro, but overall it was a strong supplementary income source. Neos would never see an official TV airing, though, during the airing of Ultraman Cosmos, his show would see an appearance on TV. When the actor for Cosmos’s main character was caught in a legal endeavor (of which he was proven innocent), Ultraman Cosmos was temporarily pulled from air until it cleared up. So in the meantime, Neos was chosen to air in Cosmos’s time slot, where it would find its biggest success yet and gain a larger following than ever before. Neos would also begin to serve as the face for Tsuburaya across other Asian regions due to him being similar enough to the original Ultraman in design to be recognized as an Ultra, but not similar enough to increase legal drama with Chaiyo… which is a big story in itself. So with that he begun to show up in multiple advertisements, stage shows designed for the foreign market, and endorsement deals across Asia until the debut of Ultraman Ribut who took his place as the face of Ultra in the SEA regions.

Ultraman Neos in a State Farm commercial

Neos went far for a show that was initially shot down and declared too uninteresting to gain ratings. Neos is a real underdog story like many of the other productions from this time period by Tsuburaya. No matter what hit it, Neos would get up and never give up. Its production history is a story of death and resurrection, which in itself is fitting for an Ultra Series. Neos is the prime example of Tsuburaya not letting an idea die and trying to bring it to their fans because they know there was a chance to succeed from it and that people would love it. Remember don’t give up~, don’t give up~, like Neos.

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Sources

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultraman_Neos
• https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%A6%E3%83%AB%E3%83%88%E3%83%A9%E3%83%9E%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8D%E3%82%AA%E3%82%B9
• https://dic.nicovideo.jp/a/%E3%82%A6%E3%83%AB%E3%83%88%E3%83%A9%E3%83%9E%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8D%E3%82%AA%E3%82%B9
• https://www.vap.co.jp/neos/dvdbox.html
• https://dic.pixiv.net/a/%E3%82%A6%E3%83%AB%E3%83%88%E3%83%A9%E3%83%9E%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8D%E3%82%AA%E3%82%B9
• https://news.mynavi.jp/article/20180306-ultraman/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k287GF-ZyOY
• https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1985904/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzwJTmaJY4Q
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUVZUzUMLSQ
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gy9xXl0f3qE